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If you are thinking about travelling to China, now may not be the best time. Currently, the country is in the middle of bracing itself for a huge typhoon that is rolling up to its coastline. This storm, called typhoon Fitow, is scheduled to hit land today (Monday) around Fujian and Zhejian. It is a huge typhoon and is expected to do a lot of damage.

China has gone into lockdown mode as the storm nears. Water levels around the coast are predicted to rise at least two meters as the storm approaches. China is even telling citizens and tourists that they need to evacuate certain cities before the storm hits. The maritime authorities in China have given this issue the highest alert possible for storms.

Of course, China is no stranger to typhoons. This is the 23 typhoon that has hit China this year alone. A lot of this has to do with the pure size of China. It is so large, that the chances of a typhoon hitting its coastline are greater. This typhoon, however, will cause waves that reach as high as 10 meters in parts of the East China Sea and around the waters of Diaoyu Island. This information was brought to light by the National Marine Environmental Forecasting Center in China.

All of the local fishermen have been told to report back to port. However, at the time of this writing, not all fishermen had come back to port. Some are still out trying to catch fish before the storm hits. This is a good time of the year for fishing in China and the fishermen want to make the most of it. This goes double since there will be less fishermen out collecting fish because of the storm.

This storm has, of course, affected travel as well. For example, a number of the bullet trains that typically run between cities like Fujian, Jiangxi and Zhejiang have been halted. This means that services on more than 35 lines have been affected. The lack of service between these cities has even gone on to affect service at other stations located in Nanjing, Shanghai, Beijing and Ningbo.

On top of this, some tourists were unable to leave China due to the Wenzhou airport having to cancel a number of flights. As of this writing, nearly 30 flights had been cancelled. This is a number that some experts expect will grow more as the storm approaches. However, at this time, there was no indication of just how many flights would be affected before the storm passes. There is, of course, a chance that flights will be cancelled after the storm as well. This depends on the amount of damage and rain this storm dumps on China before it passes.

Tourists in China need to listen to local authorities and evacuate to a safe place. They also need to contact their airlines to see if their flights have been delayed and if the airline is willing to refund their money or book them on another flight.